Action Rail Hole Spacing

[Ron Nossaman]

>Anyone have any great ideas for how to accurately space screw holes in an 
>action rail? I need to make a new let-off rail for an old M&H upright and 
>the only way I can figure to do it is to use the old one as a guide and 
>mark the new wooden rail. Is there a better way to space?
>
>Terry Farrell

Yes. It's not my idea, but I happen to think it's pretty great. You start 
with two parallel lines with a line drawn perpendicular to, and 
intersecting both. Then, a similar series of lines is drawn in a fan, 
indexed from the original perpendicular, with one set of line ends at a 
chosen regular spacing, and the other ends at another chosen regular 
spacing bigger or smaller than the first. That's your template. If your 
proposed scale spacing progression is regular, rather than progressive, you 
keep the scale stick parallel to the original parallel lines, and line it 
up where the number of points needed coincides with the number of lines in 
the fan, at the overall length needed, and mark the intersections of the 
fanned lines with the stick on the stick. If you want a progressive 
spacing, you do the same, only you slant the stick off parallel with the 
original parallel lines, The more the slant, the greater the progression 
rate. If you have a measurement between two end points, the number of 
centers required, and a measurement from one end point to any point between 
the two ends (the closer to the center the better), you can reproduce any 
regular progressive scale spacing.

Ron N